


Make Them Proud

by CadomirBane



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Childhood Memories, Emo boy angsting, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-19
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-07 16:28:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5463350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CadomirBane/pseuds/CadomirBane
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A flashback to Kylo Ren's childhood and his earliest push to the Dark Side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Make Them Proud

**Author's Note:**

> This fic reveals some MAJOR spoilers from The Force Awakens, so please don't read unless 1) you've already seen the movie, or 2) you don't care about spoilers.

She wrapped her arms around her son.  He was small for his age…skinny, pale.  His lips trembled as she hugged him tight.

“You’ll be okay, Ben.  Uncle Luke will take care of you.”

He swallowed hard, feeling a lump in his throat.  He had always hated crying in front of anyone, but especially his father.  When he did, his father would give him a small shove—not to hurt him, but as if to ‘knock him to his senses.’  _“Pull yourself together.  Boys don’t cry.”_ And Ben knew he would not see his parents for several weeks at least…or longer.  Who knew how much Uncle Luke’s training for him at the new Jedi Academy would keep him apart from them.  He could not let his mother see him crying helplessly as her last image of him until they met again.

“Make us proud, son.”  His father stood a short distance away.  He had already given Ben a quick hug goodbye.  Ben never remembered being hugged longer than half a second by his father, even when he was a toddler.

_Make us proud._ So being a Jedi was the only way he could actually make his parents proud of him, Ben mused.  Living a life of his own defined by no one…being _himself_ …that would make his family disappointed in him.  Can’t have that.

“I will.”  Ben clenched his jaw as he looked at his father.

She noticed the tension stir up in her son instantly.  Her focus was cut off when the Republic cruiser landed on the platform a hundred yards or so behind them.  Ben’s small backpack lay beside him but he did not pick it up.

“That’s your ship.  It’s time,” she said softly.

“I don’t want to go, Mama.”  He looked up at her, eyes hopelessly pleading.  He must have said that to her a hundred times since his parents informed him he was going to be sent away to be trained as a Jedi.  This was his last chance, and maybe, just maybe, this time he would get through to them.  “Please don’t make me go?”

“I’m so sorry.”  She cupped his face.  “It’s going to be all right, I promise.”

“No, it’s not!  I don’t want to be a Jedi!”

Now she was getting frustrated with him all over again.

“Don’t do this…Ben, just don’t.  I’ll walk you to the ship.”  She took her son’s hand.

He took it when he realized there was no convincing either of his parents now.  His time was up.  Uncle Luke walked down the ramp of the ship and greeted them with a kind smile, then offered Ben his hand.  As Ben released his mother’s hand and took his uncle’s, a hollow pit formed in his stomach.  And he discovered, with horrific dread, that he had lost any true home.  ‘Home’ could not longer be with his parents, and the Academy could never be home either.  He did not belong anywhere in the galaxy anywhere.

He was lost.

This life could never be for him.  Every time Ben thought of what waited for him at the Academy, his stomach tied itself in knots.  The thought of being trapped by rules and codes.  Surrounded by others like him who had to become Jedi because of their strong connection to the Force.  Uncle Luke had told them that Ben must be trained, that he was destined to become one of the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy.  Someday, he said, Ben would be a great leader in the Academy…and there was no denying he had the potential.

But Ben had never had dreamed of the Academy, or becoming a Jedi.  His future would die there, he felt.  Ben’s dreams were filled with endless stars and worlds with no names, faces he had yet to meet, stories to be heard and adventures beckoning him.  A life in which he could use the Force to spread his wings and explore the galaxy all on his own, learning new things every day, growing within himself as the Force showed him all the darkness and beauty and horror and rebirth the universe had to offer, and more.

All of that would die when he went to the Academy.  And for what?  To make a better future for other people who could not care less about him?  To make all the grown-ups be impressed by him?  To change the galaxy for the better?

What about making his own life better?  What about building a future for his own, rather than everyone else except himself?

It wasn’t…fair.

_Make them proud._ He supposed, if letting his true future die is what it would take to make everyone in his life see him as something of a success, it had to be worth the cost.  But someday Ben would no longer see it that way.


End file.
